The invention relates to a vending machine which has an associated goods store, which goods store is stocked in ordered fashion by means of a plurality of goods carriers, comprising a goods input region for inserting old goods intended for exchange, return, or new purchase, comprising a data processing device and a data storage device, and comprising signal transducers, which are each associated with a goods carrier or a group of goods carriers, wherein the signal transducers have a signal link to the data processing device.
Such vending machines are known in numerous embodiments, for example cigarette vending machines, drinks vending machines, snacks vending machines or the like. After the insertion of money, product selection and possibly, in the case of cigarette vending machines, age verification via the user interface, the desired product is made accessible from the goods store to the user via the goods output apparatus.
Many goods, for example ink cartridges for printers, can be recycled after use. For this, there are collection points into which the goods can be inserted after use. However, the user often does not have the inducement to do this, with the result that numerous valuable goods are disposed of in the household waste after use and are therefore no longer available to the materials cycle. Furthermore, in the case of those products which are offered in numerous different embodiments, the user is confronted with the problem that it is difficult for him to judge without any expert advice and/or time-consuming study of the various product embodiments which of these product embodiments he now actually requires and which product embodiment would actually be an incorrect purchase for him.
WO-A-92/01273 as prior art has already disclosed a vending machine of the type mentioned at the outset which is used in the car rental industry for dispensing car keys for the customer. These car keys, which form a goods store, are stocked in ordered fashion on a plurality of goods carriers located in the housing interior of the previously known vending machine. In this case, the goods carriers can be configured as spiral bars which are drivable in rotary fashion by a motor and on which the car keys are held, wherein one of these spiral bars can be intended for car keys of large cars, a further spiral bar can be intended for car keys of medium-sized cars and a third spiral bar can be intended for car keys of small cars. The previously known vending machine also has an identification apparatus which is configured, for example, as a card reader and is intended to read the data identifying the user which are stored on a credit card. If a specific user is identified once his data stored on the credit card have been read, a data processing device with a data storage device can assign these data to the motor vehicle intended for the user and the associated car keys. The data processing device transmits a corresponding signal to the motor of the spiral bar drivable in rotary fashion in question, and this spiral bar rotates until the car keys stored at the front of this spiral bar fall into a goods dispenser in order to be removed there by the user once a flap has been opened and released. The previously known vending machine also has a goods input region into which the customer can insert and return the car keys temporarily entrusted to him once the rental period has ended.
The vending machine previously known from WO-A-92/01273 is neither suitable nor intended for stocking such goods on a large number of goods carriers, for identifying old goods, and for assigning the comparable new goods and for leading a customer to the new goods he requires.
US-A-2008/0097770 already discloses a vending machine which is intended for the printer cartridges required for inkjet printers. With the previously known vending machine, the customer can select between refilling a used printer cartridge, purchasing a full printer cartridge, and returning a used printer cartridge in exchange for credit. In paragraph [0028] of US-A-2008/0097770, express mention was made of the fact that the customer not only has to choose between the abovementioned offers and the type of payment he desires, but the customer also needs to determine the printer cartridge he requires. At the latest at this point this would be too much for some customers, however, if such a customer cannot associate the printer cartridge he requires with one of the goods descriptions on offer.